Debbie Downer: Firsts

August 31 2017 by Brenna Ehrlich

Debbie Downer: Firsts

August 31 2017 by Brenna Ehrlich

Brooklyn super group Debbie Downer makes music that’s, well, kind of a downer. But in a fun way.

Including members of Total Slacker and Heliotropes, the band is relatively new; their debut EP You Know You’re Wrong just dropped this summer. Still, between the lot of them, they have tons of experience with first bands, first songs and first musical crushes. Find out more below:

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On the first record you bought with your own money… You’re gonna love it. So, mine was Ten by Pearl Jam. And my Uncle Peter bought it for me. Well, I mean I kinda saved up, but he made me go to the record store. I wanted to go to KB Toys. I was way too young to buy this album. I think they use the word ‘fuck’ on it. I got really into Pearl Jam. I thought Eddie Vedder was such a babe. – Jessica Downer

My first one was Alanis Morissette. Jagged Little Pill. I was appalled by that line where she was like, ‘Are you thinking about me when you fuck her?’ I was like ‘… what? Alanis, what’s fucking?’ So I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t know what she was saying for a really long time. – Nicole Downer

Mine’s not that cool. It’s probably Spice Girls or Backstreet Boys or something. I was naturally blonde when I was younger, so whenever I played with my friends I always had to be Baby Spice, but secretly I was always really into Ginger. – Emily Downer

Mine was a Christian rock band called Third Day. And I don’t remember which album it was. I just remember there being a lot of blue on the cover. – Jacob Downer

On first shows… Janet Jackson with my friend Moira and her mom. I think I was in the fifth grade. It was at the Cow Palace in San Francisco, which I now believe has been rebranded into Monster Park or something like that, or AT&T Stadium. I can’t remember. – Jessica Downer

On first musician crushes… Oh my god, Sebastian Bach, the singer of Skid Row.My sister’s a lot older than I am, so she had hair metal MTV on all the time when I was like four, five, six. And I remember seeing Sebastian Bach and his long, glorious hair, and I really wanted to brush it. – Jessica Downer

Definitely Justin Timberlake. For sure, I was so in love with Justin Timberlake. We were in love. It was mutual. – Nicole Downer

Weirdly, probably Trent Lane, the cartoon from Daria. – Emily Downer

Thom Yorke maybe. Thom Yorke was like my little scrawny music crush, super endearing. It was like a platonic romantic. You’re so sad. I’m so sad. You know, I just wanted to pet him. – Jacob Downer

On first songs… The first song I ever wrote was a song called ‘I Hate Everybody.’ I wrote it on a really shitty Roland keyboard that I bought off eBay in the eighth grade. I think it also involved a drum machine, a Dr. Rhythm from the ’90s, too. It kinda went like this, ‘I hate everybody. I hate everybody.’ – Jessica Downer

I wrote this song about this little boyfriend that I had when I was young and we worked together, and I just remember there was a line like, ‘You’re still alive/but you’re not with me/how could that be?’ – Nicole Downer

I can’t remember exactly what it was called. It would’ve been like a cheesy, acoustic folk song. I used to play classical guitar, so there’s a lot of finger picking in it. – Emily Downer

I don’t really write tunes, but in middle school I used to always write little songs for my projects instead of writing papers. And I had a metronome that I would use as a drum machine and talk about subdivisions and stuff and rap about earth science. – Jacob Downer

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